Friday, 15 August 2014

Remembering the Tochni Massacre

Scene at a mass grave of Turkish Cypriots discovered in August 1974

NEWS/TRNC

Forty
years ago today the war in Cyprus
ended, but not before the gruesome discovery of a variety of mass graves
containing the bodies of Turkish Cypriots. One of the worst was the Tochni
Massacre: 85 inhabitants from Taşkent (also known as Tochni), a mainly
Turkish village located in the Larnaca
District of Cyprus, about halfway between Larnaca and Limassol,
were killed by members of nationalist Greek Cypriot terror group EOKA-B.

During
the War of 1974, the villagers of Taşkent had been persuaded to give up
their arms and instead come under the protection of UN forces. On 14 August
1974, Greek Cypriots stormed the village and forcefully removed all the men.
Men were also seized from nearby Mari and Terazi villages. They were loaded on
to trucks and told they were being taken to a detention camp in Limassol. Instead
they arrived at Palodia outside the city, where they were all lined up and
shot, before bulldozers covered their bodies in a makeshift mass grave.

Although
badly injured, Taşkent’s Suat Hussein Kafadar survived the atrocity and managed
to get to nearby British base Akrotiri where he was able to give details of the
events that took place, as well as identify some of the perpetrators including Andriko
Melani. His eyewitness testimony was backed by Naciye Turgut, a female villager
from Terazi, who said:

“Andriko Melani and Stasis Aradipyotis,
both from Tochni, and Akis from Mari, along with soldiers from EOKA-B came to
our home on 14 August and said they wanted to talk to my husband. They said
they wanted to question my husband, and took him along with my 24-year-old twin
brother Arif Hüseyin Ahmet and 13 other men. We never saw them again.”

On
hearing that the Tochni Massacre had been uncovered, the perpetrators moved the
bodies to another location. The remains were discovered some ten years ago and the
UN continues to work to identify who they are. To date, the Greek Cypriot
authorities have failed to bring any of the suspects to justice, even though a
file with extensive details was handed to them in 2005 by the lawyer acting for the
families of the Taşkent victims.

Greek
Cypriots also committed similar atrocities in the northwest of the island. Turkish
forces arrived too late to save the Turkish Cypriot inhabitants of Atlılar, Muratağa
and Sandallar villages near Mağusa. The men of fighting age from these villages
had gone to defend their local area, leaving the women, children and the elderly
behind, who were brutally murdered by Greek Cypriot militia. Witnessed by international
media at the end of August 1974, the UN forces dug up a total of 146 people that had been buried in two mass
graves.

The
1974 War was the culmination of a bitter 11-year conflict that had engulfed Cyprus
following its outbreak in December 1963 when Greek Cypriots brutally seized
power and forced their former partners, the Turkish Cypriots, out of government
in a period known as ‘Bloody Christmas’. In the ensuing years, fifty percent of
Turkish Cypriots became refugees, some three times over. Many lived in enclaves
or refugee camps enduring immense hardship and oppression.

Nicos Sampson threatened genocide against Turkish Cypriots

The
situation was set to deteriorate following a Greece-backed coup that installed Nicos
Sampson – a notorious murderer – as the new President of Cyprus on 15 July 1974.
Sampson not only attacked Greek Cypriots loyal to former President Makarios,
but also threatened to commit genocide against Turkish Cypriots: "Had Turkey not intervened I would not
only have proclaimed 'Enosis', I would have annihilated the Turks in
Cyprus." (Nicos Sampson interview published in Eleftherotipia, 26 Feb.
1981).

Five
days later Turkey,
one of three Guarantor Powers, intervened on the island to restore peace. Over
a period of thirty days, the Turkish military took control of a third of the island
and decided to extend the division of Nicosia, known as the Green Line that
was first created by the British in
1964 to keep the two warring communities apart, to the rest of the island. The bi-communal
bi-zonal re-settlement of people in Cyprus was ratified by the Population
Agreement of 1975 and reinforced by the High Level Agreements of 1977 and 1979
that were signed by leaders of both communities.

The
11-year Cyprus Conflict claimed the lives of hundreds of people and displaced thousands
of refugees from both communities, with atrocities committed by both sides.

About Me

Launched in April 2013, T-VINE is the UK's first & only English language consumer publication for British Turks and those interested in the world of Turks. Available quarterly in print and online daily, we cover news, culture, people, places, wellbeing, and lifestyle.